Please explain Imbuements to me?

[rerednaw]

I don't have the ruleset but other members of my party are using it. We are playing standard Dungeon Fantasy GURPS and so have starting characters with 250 points.

From what I've seen it seems to be a way to give martials spellcasting without IQ, Magery, or taking extra time. Is that the intent?

These are some of the uses I have seen:
Add enhancements (fire, acid, etc.) to a martial-based strike and attack during the same round.
Conjure ranged attacks that work like missile spells without taking a turn to create the effect. Skill levels of 15 are sufficient to make imbuement time zero.
Triple the striking strength (ST 12 ->14 through one effect and then 42 through a second) plus attack and do this every round.

The effects are definitely cinematic and seem to be a great deal with little downside. Having not to worry about MAD (multi-attribute-dependency) or extra time in the middle of combat is amazing.

Oh I have one more question: Are they subject to critical failure effects like spells or not?

Thanks!